


Book Wyrm

by Jazzy_Rawr



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Angst, Personal Growth, book shop
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-12
Updated: 2018-07-12
Packaged: 2019-06-09 04:09:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,806
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15259128
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Jazzy_Rawr/pseuds/Jazzy_Rawr
Summary: Yet another Hermione bookshop AU. The prompt for this story came up in my fanfic group and the plot bunnies were off and running, and now here we all are.After the War Hermione is tired, so she decides to grab some peace for herself by opening a bookstore. Armed with determination and the help of an intrepid Winky Hermione is determined to find contentment. Just as soon as she figures out who the mysterious man who frequents her shop is. She is after all still Hermione Granger.





	Book Wyrm

Everyone had expected amazing things from the “Brightest Witch of the Age,” she had been expected to revolutionize Magic, to lead the government, be the Morgana to Harry’s Merlin, to remain at the forefront of a new era of magical peace and prosperity, and most importantly to marry Ronald Weasley. But Hermione was tired, she was tired of sacrifice, tired of heroism, and utterly exhausted of pretending that end of the war had had any real effect on the minds of all the witches and wizards too cowardly to fight in it. She had given; her childhood, her innocence, her family, and many of her friends to the cause, and at long last she was done giving. If she was going to be called an upstart Mudblood, she was going to be called an upstart Mudblood in her own shop that she had every right to chuck people out of, and not as a member of the much lauded “Golden Trio” always burdened with an image to maintain. 

Hermione was done being a hero. Done saving people, and ready, finally, to focus on saving herself.

She bought herself a war ravaged building in Hogsmeade, and began to devote all her time to restoring it, she straightened the walls, and cleaned the brick, and found herself somehow all at once with a usable shell of a building. Hermione ventured up to Hogwarts Castle to ask about where to obtain lumber for the interior of her building when she encountered Winky, drunk and sobbing on the step of Hagrid’s cabin. Despite her resolution that she was done with being a hero, it wasn’t in her to leave the sobbing elf without even trying to help. So Hermione sat down on the step next to her and gently patted the elf’s heaving back,

“What’s wrong Winky?”

“Winky misses her family!”

The elf shrieked, and Hermione had to fight back the urge to cringe away,

“You actually miss the people who abused you?”

Hermione snapped horrified, and Winky’s sobs slowed down a bit glaring at her with huge wet eyes,

“No, Winky misses the personal magic of having a family. Hogwarts is not the same.”

Hermione fell quiet as she contemplated this, she thought about her building and her shop, and the amount of work it would be for one person, how alone she had felt since she broke from the Golden Trio and the Order, and it made her understand, at least in part, how alone Winky must feel.

“Perhaps we can come to an agreement Winky.”

Winky looked up her the anger flashing away all at once to hope,

“You know a family that needs Winky?”  
Hermione shook her head,

“Not a family no, a witch who is alone a bit like you.”

Winky was nodding before Hermione could finish her statement,

“Winky will be taking good care of her.”

Hermione nodded,

“Well Winky, this witch would have some strange job requirements, she would want to pay you for your work, and give you rest times, and figure out how to give you decent things to wear without severing the bond.”

Winky was shaking her head so emphatically it was slapping her ears against her face,

“Winky not accepting gold.”

Hermione pushed down the first flare of frustration and soldiered on,

“Well surely there are things that you like?”

“Winky likes chocolate, and tea, and pretty cloths.”

Hermione nodded,

“Then that is what you would be compensated in.”  
“Winky agrees to strange witch.”

Hermione stood brushing the soot from her robes,

“Then come along Winky, and lets see what we can do about that.

Hogwarts was wiling to release Winky for nothing more than a single knut to bind the contract, as she brought disruption to the kitchens, and after an extensive shopping trip to a fabric store, and Honeydukes, Winky’s advance was paid. She had dogged Hermione’s steps, and what had been little more than act of charity turned out to be Hermione’s saving grace. That little house elf mothered her fiercely, defended her with ferocity, and once taught to read devoured books with an almost alarming alacrity, and debated the subjects she found there with great willingness.

She was in short, Hermione’s best friend, and between the two of them the work of establishing the Book Wyrm was soon over, and even a little fun.

Hermione surrounded herself with her books, in pages filled with knowledge that had no malice towards her for reading them, and stories where Good triumphing meant something, and every morning she opened her shop with a smile on her face that pretended she hadn’t just passed another sleepless night haunted by the war and her squandered hopes, and keeping devoted Winky by her side yet again. It was a simple life, but a content one, and Hermione threw herself into that daily simplicity of a book shop with the same enthusiasm she had displayed when throwing herself into saving the Wizarding World. In the pages of her books, and Winky’s steady care she found the balm for her shattered heart.

Hermione had made it a point to open two weeks into to August so she could correct any issues that arose before her Grand Opening September first, and when the first term opened at the newly rebuilt Hogwarts Hermione was more than ready with not only the required school books, but with helpful companion books, and work books, and a robust fiction section to give a tired mind a break, her little cafe corner was loaded with coffee and tea, and every sort of biscuit she and Winky could think of between them, she even sold some minor potions of a sort useful to students from behind the counters, with a dedicated owl always ready to notify Madame Pomfrey if the purchases became worrying.

That first week of school Hermione did a roaring trade, the shop was packed with parents picking up the perpetual few last things, and her order owls constantly winging in and out with express deliveries to the dorms Hermione barely paused for breath from open until close, never mind having the presence of mind to remember any one particular face.

After the back to school rush things predictably slowed, and she had soon struck the perfect balance of impressing enough people to to keep busy and profitable, but not so busy she couldn’t have a cup of tea in the afternoon. 

As the afternoons went on, Hermione settled into a routine with her tea, and a novel during the slowest part of the mid afternoon, Winky would do her version of resting, which this week seemed to be wandering around dusting shelves. She always believed firmly that books were for fun, which came only after dinner and on sundays, and no amount of Hermione arguing had been able to cure that, so as soon as the book opened a cup of tea and a sandwich would appear at her elbow and Winky would be off to sweep or dust or arrange shelves, her own lunch floating agreeably along behind her.

Around two weeks into this quiet routine Hermione began to notice a darkly dressed man slipping between the shelves keeping his head down as he stopped occasionally to study a book, which he would inevitably reshelve and leave without. But no sooner had she noticed and began to wonder than her mind slid away and was again occupied by her book, or some small task that seemed somehow urgent. It would take her almost two weeks to realize this was the work of a subtle Notice Me Not charm.  
Hermione may be running a bookstore for peace and contentment, but she was still Hermione, and the man going so far out of his way to be unnoticed had piqued her curiosity, so every day she watch the door out of the corner of her eye and wait for his arrival.

A month later he arrived in a rain storm, and lifted his head long enough to dry his hair, the full look at his face, combined with Hermione concentrating very hard on noticing him was enough to dispel the Notice Me Not charm, and she had to stifle a gasp when she realized her mysterious book aficionado was none other than Severus Snape.

Hermione continued watching her former Potion’s Professor stalk the shelves, and leave once again without bringing anything up to the counter. About an hour later an order form arrived by owl, and Hermione recognized the hand writing, and wondered how she had not done so sooner. Had she been speaking to Harry she would have apologized for calling him ‘thick’ over the whole Half Blood Prince debacle.  
Now that she had noticed the pattern, Hermione began looking for it, and none of the Notice Me Not charms worked on her perception anymore, and so as she studied the man who had been her professor, she noticed that the limp from her first year had become more pronounced, and that the collar on his robes, which had always been high, now stretched all the way up to his jaw line, and he flexed his left hand constantly as if it pained him. 

Hermione filed all this information away without even being sure why she was gathering it, getting involved with Professor Snape and his shopping habits was not in line with her resolve to leave the War, and the Order behind her, but she had questions, and none of her books had the answer, so she watched him.

Hermione watched Severus Snape shop at her bookstore for months without a word passing between them, but on month four she caved to Winky’s insistent requests to bring him a cup of tea, which he waved away, but Hermione, now wondering who would refuse tea in a Scottish winter would not be deterred, and started sending him tea everyday. Eventually, begrudgingly, he started to accept it.

On month six Hermione encouraged Winky in her natural impulses to feed everyone she encountered, and so the tea began to grow to include biscuits and sandwiches, and Hermione still wondered why he came in, looked around, then left only to owl order his books. Was he avoiding everyone, or her in particular? Was he as haunted by the War as she was? Was he fleeing the memories? Could it be that she the Gryffindor Princess, and the Snarky Dungeon-Bat might actually have something in common?

It would be another two months before she got up the courage to ask any of those questions.  
But finally she mustered up the last dregs of her Gryffindor courage, and one day she intercepted Winky on the way with his tea and sandwich, and strode up to him herself,

“Good Afternoon Professor Snape, I’m so thrilled my bookstore holds such a draw for you.”


End file.
